Bodyguard
by Blu Rose
Summary: KenTom: Once upon a time, there was a young samurai who was the bodyguard of a samurai lord's daughter. But what he didn't expect was to fall in love with her. oneshot AU R


Hola, my people. I am bored, so I am writing this piece of fiction. Another RK oneshot but this time it's KenshinXTomoe. (How did that coupling enter my mind?) Anyways, I hope you enjoy it.

Disclaimer: I do not own Rurouni Kenshin or its characters. I only own this piece of fanfiction.

Summary: "Once upon time there was a young swordsman, who was supposed to be the bodyguard of a samurai lord's beautiful daughter. But what he wasn't supposed to do was fall in love with her." KenTom AU

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"Tell me a story." Said the little boy in front of him, sitting down in a chair, swinging his legs back and forth.

"I don't know any. Why don't you ask one of your caretakers or your mother to tell you a story?" The old man said as his violet eyes gazed at the young child.

The boy huffed and crossed his arms over his chest. "I wanna hear a story from _you._ Don't tell me you don't know even _one_ story."

The old man sighed and let his long snow-white bangs cover his eyes. "Okay. Once upon a time, there was a young swordsman…" The little boy looked on with delight. "At the time, he was only fifteen summers old…"

_A red-haired fifteen-year old carrying a katana was standing in a huge crowd of people-all men, far older than him that held swords of their own._

"There was a big tournament in the city, to see which samurai would certify to be a bodyguard to the Yukishiro family."

The boy blinked. "Yukishiro?" He pronounced. "That's my name!"

The old man smiled and nodded. "Hai. The boy wanted to be a bodyguard just like the rest of the men. But they were samurai and he was merely a talented young ronin that wanted a place to stay and food to eat for free."

The boy blinked in confusion again.

"When the tournament started, everyone else thought the boy would be killed by his first opponent." The red-haired teen was standing in front of a large man with an axe twice as big as the boy. People in the crowd were all saying that the boy would be demolished and that he was foolish for entering in the first place. The teen just stood there and waited for the man to attack. The huge samurai ran forward, axe raised and about to strike the redhead… 

"What happened? Why'd you stop?" The boy asked.

"You won't like this part. Too much violence. It will scare you." The old man said.

"No, no! I'm not afraid! Just go on." The boy protested.

"Okay…but I warned you…"

The huge samurai raised the sword and slashed the boy in half, right down the middle. He thought he'd won, but it turned out that he sliced nothing but air. He looked around to find the boy, but it was too late. The boy had come down from the air, sword first, and sliced the man almost in half. 

The young boy gulped in fear. His eyes widened. "I told you it was too violent." The old man said.

"No, no. I'm just…a bit cold. Go on, go on." The boy said.

Everyone else's eyes widened at the sight of the other man falling to the ground. The boy looked down at his opponent's corpse, its blood slowly flowing from it. He shook the blood of his katana and sheathed it. The referee declared the boy the winner. The rest of the fights were as easy as the first for the teen. In the end, the boy, along with other samurai became bodyguards.

"Is that it? That wasn't a good story!" The boy exclaimed. "It was too short!"

"I'm not done yet." The old man explained. "That was only the beginning. Now where was I…?" The old man leaned the back of his head on the chair, trying to remember what came next. "…Ah, yes. To the boy's surprise, his job wasn't anything hard. He wasn't protecting the head of the family, nor was he an outside guard. Instead, he was a bodyguard to the head's daughter."

_The boy was standing in front of the door to Tomoe's room. He gulped. He didn't know how this girl acted, so he didn't how'd she'd react to him. He warily opened the door a bit. "Yukishiro-dono?" When he didn't get a response, he opened it wider and poked his head inside. He noticed that the room was very wide. _

_A young woman about eighteen years old was sitting on a chair next to the open window. In her hands was a small leather-bound book. She didn't seem to her the ronin._

"_Excuse me, Yukishiro-dono?"_

_She heard him and stood up. He hesitated a gasp when he saw her face. She was a beautiful young woman with long, straight raven-black hair, skin the color of freshly fallen snow and obsidian colored eyes that you could get lost in. "Are you my new bodyguard?" She asked in an almost-cold (In the boy's opinion) voice. He nodded. Her scent, hakubaku wrapped around his senses. She walked towards him and looked at him. "You are…too young to be a swordsman."_

_The ronin felt a bit insulted. "What I lack in age, I make up for in skill…Yukishiro-dono."_

"_You don't have to call me that." Tomoe said. "My name is Tomoe, so call me that."_

_The redhead blinked. "Um…okay, Tomoe-dono."_

"_And your name is?" Tomoe asked._

"_Hm?"_

"_If you're going to be my bodyguard, it's only fair if I know your name, right?"_

_The redhead nodded. "Kenshin. Himura Kenshin." Kenshin bowed to Tomoe._

"_Okay, Himura-san. I hope we can become close."_

'_So do I.' Kenshin thought._

"So what happened next?" The boy asked. "It's not boring, is it?"

"Hold on. I said, have some patience." The old man said. "If you don't want to hear the rest of the story, though, I can stop."

"No! Don't stop! Keep going!" The boy exclaimed.

"Fine, fine. Time seemed to fly by, and before the ronin knew it, he had stayed there for an entire year…"

"_Kenshin, what do you think of me?" Tomoe asked him._

_Kenshin, who was standing near the door, looked at her. "Hm?"_

"_Father says that I act too cold towards the men who ask to be my suitor. But the only reason I act like that is because I don't like them. What do you think?"_

"_Um…I think…" Kenshin paused to find the words. "I think, you should only get married to the one you love." He blushed as he said this. "An arranged marriage between two people is good if they get along, but if one person doesn't like the other, then it's wrong… I think."_

"You think?" Tomoe blinked. She covered her hand over her mouth to hide a giggle. "…You're lucky. You don't come from a high-class samurai family, so you don't have to act prim and proper and be suitable marriage material." Kenshin looked down at the woman. "Since Father's health has been failing him, he may not be around for much longer. That means I have to get married to someone before then."

_A piece of Kenshin's heart broke a bit. "Who…who is going to marry you, Tomoe-dono?"_

"A man by the name of Kiyosoto Akira. I met him one time, but it wasn't exactly long enough to know him fully… He seemed nice." Tomoe smiled at Kenshin. "If he really is nice, and I do like him, I'll have to marry him…"

"What's so bad about Tomoe getting married?" The boy asked the old man.

"During the past year, Kenshin fell in love with Tomoe." His violet eyes glazed over a bit. "The cold beauty had stolen his heart during that time."

When the old man didn't say anything, the boy got a bit worried. "Hey. Hey! Are you okay?"

"Huh? Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to do that." The old man apologized. "Anyhow, a few months passed and Tomoe's father passed on. And a few months after that, Tomoe got married to Akira…"

Kenshin was leaning against a wall. Tomoe was sitting in a chair that was next to the open window showing the autumn leaves falling from the trees. Her stomach was round and poked out of her kimono. She was six months pregnant, and despite that, she pretty much stayed the same, except for the added hunger. Akira had gone off somewhere to deal with business and had been gone for a month.

"When is Akira coming back?" Tomoe asked Kenshin.

"I don't know." 'He'd better not abandon her like this, or I'll-' Before Kenshin could finish his thought, there was a knock on the door.

"Come in."

The door opened and in walked a man with a set of swords at his waist. "Tomoe-san? I have news about your husband."

Tomoe looked hopeful. "Akira is coming home soon?"

The samurai shook his head. "No. I'm sorry but…he was attacked by a band of thieves on his way home. A few of his bodyguards survived but…he didn't make it. I'm sorry." The samurai bowed and turned heel and walked out.

Kenshin looked at Tomoe. She seemed broken. "Tomoe-dono?"

"Please leave." She said softly as she laid a hand on her stomach. Kenshin stared but walked out of the room, closing the door behind him. He stood next to the door and heard her cries of sorrow.

The little boy looked saddened. "Oh…"

"Indeed." The old man said softly.

"But I think I know what happens next." The boy said. "Tomoe marries Kenshin and they lived happily ever after, right?" He grinned, thinking he'd figured it all out.

"No." The old man said.

"No?"

"No. Tomoe didn't marry Kenshin." The old man sighed. "He may have loved her, and she might've loved him, but they were both from different backgrounds, different social classes." He bowed his head. "It just wasn't meant to be."

"Then what happened?"

The old man raised his head to look at the child in front of him. "Tomoe gave birth to a baby boy and Kenshin was…sort of like their baby-sitter."

The boy arched an eyebrow. "Baby-sitter?"

"He took care of Tomoe's son, and when the son got married and had children, he raised them as well." He shook his head. "See? I told you I'm not good with stories."

The child shook his head "…No, no. It's just that I never thought the story would end like that. I thought that Tomoe would marry Kenshin and live happily ever after like in the fairy tales."

"Not every story has a happy ending."

"One more thing: you said the bodyguard's name was Himura Kenshin, right?"

The old man nodded. "Hai."

"But…your name's Himura too, right?" The boy looked up at the old man in confusion. Before he could get an answer, the door opened and a woman walked in.

"Jiro-chan, there you are." The woman walked over to the child. "I was looking for you all over." She looked at the old man out of the corner of her eye. "Was he bothering you, Himura-san?"

"No, not at all." He waved a hand tiredly at the woman.

"He was telling me a story." Jiro smiled up at the woman.

"Well that sounds nice." She picked Jiro up and set him on the ground. "Tell him thank you, Jiro-chan."

"Yes, Mama." The child ran over to Kenshin and hugged one of his legs. "Thank you!" He let go and quickly ran out the door, followed by his mother who closed the door shut.

"I can't believe you didn't tell him what happened to Tomoe." A familiar cool-sounding voice said behind Kenshin. "Why didn't you say that she died during the birth of her child?"

"Because I didn't want to make him more sad." Kenshin said. He looked beside him and saw a young, transparent Tomoe. "I heard that the only way you could see the dead is if you're going to die soon. Is that true?"

Tomoe shrugged. "Maybe. I don't know."

"But you know I'll die in a few months, right?" Kenshin lowered his head, his long bangs covered his eyes. He felt something cool touch his cheek. He looked up and Tomoe in front of him, her transparent hand on his cheek.

"Look at it this way, Kenshin. Maybe…we can have another chance in another life."

He smiled at her. "Maybe." He tried to stifle a yawn. "I'm so tired." His eyelids became a bit droopy. "I hope we'll see each other soon, Tomoe-dono." He closed his eyes.

Tomoe leaned forward and gave him a small kiss on the cheek. "I know we will." He passed on with a content look on his face, because he knew he'd get a second chance at love, in another life.

_**End**_

How'd you like that? I don't know where this all came from, but I hope you'll like it…


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